Fixed it for you! Check at the record of qualification when they were teammates in 1988-1989, Senna dominated Prost often out qualifying him by over a second a lap in the same car. By the same arguments about reliability that can be made for Prost, Senna was also let down by his machinery. Truth is they were both among the greatest ever and made eachother that much better. Their dominance over all other drivers from their era is difficult to question, just think about the records either one would have been able to establish if the other one was not taking wins away from him. It was a truly special time, and while it got very ugly from both sides, they both were significantly better than their peers. I feel very priviledged to have been a fan during their era. They patched things up in the end, I think we can all get along as well.
As with Schumacher, Alonso, and now Vettel, I didn't like him while he was driving because he wasn't behind the wheel of the Ferrari. But as with Schu, Hamilton, Vettel, Alonso, etc, I can always appreciate a talented driver when I see one. I do get some of what you're saying about the "canonization" of Ayrton, but to me he was the best I've seen. Looking at the Top Gear special above, most of today's drivers agree with that.
Jus one - minor - point, if I may I know that the french are usually suspected to be first and foremost incorrigible machiavelian politicians, and perhaps it might be true, but while Prost was very good at dealing with inside politics in a racing team (he sometimes failed in this, too: see how he was fired from Ferrari) he has not the "national support" that most people think he had, and especially not from Renault. May I remind you that after he stopped racing, he came back as an advisor, not to Renault (with Williams, or Benetton) but with McLaren, a team that was always dear to his heart. When Prost was sacked by Renault at the end of 1983, there was much acrimony left, especially as Prost felt - and I still think rightly so - that Renault was trying to lay the blame of the title lost at the last minute to Piquet towards Alain's door, and to him that was not fair, even not right. When Renault came back with Williams, relations with Prost were never really enthusiastic, but rather lukewarm; there was a mutual feeling of unfinished business between the two, yes, and they both wanted to put that right, but never real enthusiasm. Also, if my memory serves me well, there was a clause in the deal between Renault and Williams which said that, while Renault should be consulted by Williams about the choice of drivers, the final choice always remained with Frank Williams alone. This mirrored the clause that was existing between Honda and Williams before, and Frank and Patrick Head never left the driver's choice to anyone but themselves. When he negociated his deal with Frank Williams during the summer of 1992, I don't believe that Alain Prost may have received more than "some" support from Renault. But of course, perhaps Ayrton Senna might have felt otherwise. It may seem hard to believe from abroad, I know, but Prost never was hugely popular here in France; popular, yes, but probably not as a four-time World Champion should be, and certainly there were at least an equal number of Senna fans among the french fans, probably even more. As for Balestre, I well remember that Senna had a personal feud with him, but while Balestre was an autocratic ruler of the FISA, he was also a controversial person here in France at the time due to question marks remaining about his affiliations during the second world war (if someone is reading french, have a look at the wikipedia article about him in the French Wikipedia); and at the time, that was very sensitive here. Most frenchmen would avoid being closely associated with him; most probably, french corporate officials would restrict their contacts with him to the minimum necessary. I never believed that there could have been any strong relation between Prost and him, or him and any corporate company for that matter: the guy was simply too controversial. There never was such thing as a french union of interests between Balestre, Renault and Prost. I understand that Ayrton might have suspected Balestre to support Prost more than him, but the truth is that Balestre was an autocrat and would not have accepted any driver questioning his decisions; and when Senna did, JMB decided to have him obey; simple as that. And about my preference between Prost and Senna, well I remain neutral. But I'm with Tom Spirot about Ayrton: a great driver yes, but the greatest? from a pure driving perspective perhaps; as a sportsman, not by any means: he lacked sportsmanship or class. Read the hilarious account by Mika Häkkinen in "Motorsport Magazine" (about two years ago, in their "lunch with" serie) of Senna's reaction when Mika beat him at the qualifications of the Portuguese Grand Prix 1993 to see how the man considered himself above all others. Rgds
For sure. He came in and took over the team completely. Then again Prost was in the title fight where as Mansell was not. It was pretty much sour grapes if you ask me. As great a racer as Mansell was, boy did he whine about everything. I saw a BBC special about him recently and when I heard some of his comments about his time in Indycars all I could do was shake my head and laugh.
Alain Prost realistic and honest as always; I loved these qualities. He was often too honest sometimes.
Prost was a coward and Senna was a ****, what's the news? When he had a car that won 15 of 16 races, all the drivers but two were in inferior conditions and he didn't talk about fair play then. That was also disrespectful to Mansell too, I don't know how he resisted the impulse of beating the **** out of Senna.
